If you are having issues sharing your screen, or received a notification explaining that you need to enable Screen Share permissions — do not worry! It is a standard notification when you're screen sharing with Google Chrome. If you are running macOS Catalina — version 10.15 or later — you must grant access to Screen Recording Permission in order to share your screen during a Vowel meeting. This is an Apple security setting and we, unfortunately, do not have control over this. You will only need to do this once.

This help doc will quickly walk you through the steps to start sharing your screen. In order to support sharing your Desktop or an application window, your browser requires the necessary permissions in order to have access to capture your screen. This is supported on Mac OS through Screen Recording permissions. Please note, however, that you may still be able to share a Chrome tab, even without enabling this permission.

1. You may be automatically prompted with the below notification. If so, you will need to click "Open System Preferences".

IMPORTANT: If you do not see the dialog above, or you are unable to screen share, you will need to manually open System Preferences. To do this, first open System Preferences (“Apple Menu” -> System Preferences). Next, open your Security & Privacy settings.

To enable Screen Recording, make sure you select the Privacy tab to get to your Privacy Settings.

Once on Privacy Settings, click on “Screen Recording” from the scrollable pane on the left (please note that the list of options are not sorted alphabetically), and then click “Screen Recording” in the sidebar. You will see a list of applications appear on the right side, under the instructions: “Allow the apps below to record the contents of your screen, even while using other apps.”

IMPORTANT: To make these necessary changes, you will need to click the “padlock icon” on the bottom of your settings window, labeled “Click the lock to make changes.”

You will then be prompted to provide authentication in order to unlock these settings. You may either enter a password or use Touch ID to proceed. Once you have unlocked your Security & Privacy Settings, you will notice that the Screen Recording Options on the right have become editable, and are no longer “grayed out.” Look for “Google Chrome.app” (and any other browser you intend to use for Screen-sharing) and click the checkbox to enable screen-share access permissions.

Once you click the checkbox, a pop-up should appear, prompting you to quit Chrome in order to immediately enable screen-share permissions. We recommend clicking “Quit Now” so that you can start screen-sharing right away. After Google Chrome quits, re-open Chrome and navigate back to your Vowel meeting.

You should now be able to share your screen!

If you are still having issues, feel free to chat us or feel free to email us at hello@vowel.com and we will be happy to answer any other questions.